Price Tags Vancouver has reported on the fact that the previous Provincial Liberal Government did not release documentation that they had met with Tunnel Engineering Consultants (TEC) who are top experts on immersed tunnel design and construction over the Massey Tunnel replacement. Formed in 1988, TEC has designed and managed some of the world’s “most challenging and innovative tunnel projects. “
The memo below was suppressed from a previous Freedom of Information request to the former Liberal Provincial Government for these type of materials. The memo below dated April 8 2013 outlines that Delcan, an engineering company approached TEC to “make a presentation to the client the Province of British Columbia” and to update the client on the state of art in immersed tunnelling.”
The memo outlines that “a meeting was organized with 11 attendants from the Ministry of Transportation among which a few important decision making officials, like the regional director, regional managers and the program director for the Massey Tunnel replacement…besides general information about immersed tunnelling, special attention has been given to tunnel safety, earthquake resistance design and comparison with bridge solutions, which are among the important issues the Ministry is dealing with.”
And here is where it gets interesting~”At the end of the meeting attendants, especially the high-ranking officials said the presentation was an eye-opener to them. They further indicated that with this information a tunnel option, either as a full replacement or an additional to the existing one, again had become a viable option, where before they had disregarded that option, with a new bridge being the only viable solution”.
You can read the full memo below.M130046 Visit report George Massey Tunnel